This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Schools

MVHS Participates in Bay Area Science Olympiad

Local students took home top prize in their group for design and construction of musical instrument.

These aren't typical teenagers.

Rather than spend a dreary weekend indoors playing Xbox or watching the television,  students were among hundreds of high-schoolers and middle-schoolers from the area that participated in the Bay Area Regional Scientific Olympiad (BARSO) at Foothill High School Saturday.

Their hard worked paid off. The MVHS team took home First Place in the "Write It, Do It" competition ahead of Lynbrook High and Milpitas High.

Find out what's happening in Mountain Viewwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“It’s fun; it's outright fun,” said Mike McKee, the director of BARSO. “The kids are just very excited about it.”

The students spent the day testing musical instruments they designed and built, and seeing how their scientific minds stacked up against their peers from around the Bay Area. They did everything from play their homemade musical instruments and performing experiments to engineering small rubber-band-powered helicopters and competing in several other events.

Find out what's happening in Mountain Viewwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

BARSO has grown from 12 school teams three years ago to about 43, with a total of 400-500 students. Teams vied for gold, silver and bronze medals in each event.

MVHA sophomores Evan Cohen and John Thomas spent hours designing and building a wooden marimba and flute-like contraption out of piping.

“It was a lot of work. I feel proud about it,” Cohen, 15, said about his marimba.

They had to perform a duet in front of a small audience and were judged on how well they played.

“I spent awhile designing it,” Thomas, 15, said about his instrument. But he said he didn’t spend a lot of time practicing.

Thomas and Cohen tapped into the expertise they gained from being in their school’s band.

“I think it’s awesome,” Thomas’ mother, Nannette Thomas, said about her son’s foray into science. “He put some time into it,” she added.

A lot of the Olympiad participants said that one thing they liked about doing the experiments and designing turbines, helicopters, musical instruments and other contraptions was that it gave them a better hands-on experience than reading a textbook.

“You got to have a fundamental understanding of science in order to do this,” McKee said.  “Learning out of a traditional textbook doesn’t engage the students in the same way.”

Overall Palo Alto High finished first, Mission San Jose High second and Gunn High students placed third in the competition. Log on to barso.org to find out the results of the Bay Area Regional Science Olympiad and for more information.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?